Sudden Start
by Sparda219
Summary: Sometimes Superboy has trouble sleeping. Sometimes he finds himself with Robin.  Gen/Friendship, hints of Robin/Superboy


Sudden Start

While in the tank (his mother?), Superboy (Conner, he reminded himself) had experienced nothing but sleep that was constantly threaded through with the telepathic hum of the trio of G-Gnomes, his brothers, feeding him all of the information he would need to survive. Survive, he reflected, but maybe not the things he needed to know to really live. Those things weren't important to CADMUS.

The point was that his sleep had always been… noisy. Sleep wasn't a time of quiet, it was a time of learning and experience. When he was awake, when that doctor was ordering him around, that's when the only voice in his head was one telling him to stay quiet. To behave. To do as he was told. Then it was back in the tank to sleep and to learn and to experience things he could scarcely believe existed. He learned their names , to read and speak many languages, he learned to become like Superman.

Once he was out of the tank? The silence of sleep had been so unsettling… The first few days had been the hardest. First there was the whole _going to sleep_ thing. Standing hadn't worked, so he had to settle for a sitting position until he started to realize that laying down was where it was at. This gave him a weird sleeping schedule, so he ended up just being the sort to take lots of naps. And then there was sleep, he would close his eyes and wait a while and then wake up and time had passed, but there had been nothing that _happened_. No images or voices, no patient brotherly feelings directed at him.

Once time it happened he'd awakened in the middle of the night so unsettled he didn't want to go back to sleep. In fact he didn't want to be alone… Unsure of what else to do he got up and went to Robin's room. The Boy Wonder had been… warm. Welcoming. Even after Superboy had tried to kill him, and even after he'd stayed with Kid Flash, for some reason Robin remained the one he wanted to go to for this. Maybe it was the part of him that knew he was the smallest and weakest and needed the most protecting. Maybe it was because Kid Flash was cranky when he was woken up and he wasn't even sure how Martians slept, so he didn't want to get into that.

He knocked on the door and felt stupid about it immediately like he should turn right around, but there was a sleepy 'Mrrrrrwha?' And then the door opened with a soft swshh sound. There was Robin sleepily pushing his sunglasses up, clad in a pair of boxers and an oversized hoodie that must have been great for sleeping in. Superboy was still in the jeans and t-shirt they gave him earlier, his new 'uniform.' As Superboy had hoped, Robin just gave a sleepy chuckle and leaned against his door frame, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Supey? Hey. Umm, it's real early still, what's up?"

It took Superboy a little fidgeting and staring at his socked feet before he turned his eyes up to Robin and ground out his request.

"Can I… sleep in here with you? It's so quiet."

Conner felt a strong pang of sympathy for Megan and even more remorse for how he'd treated her that first time she probed at his mind, she must feel this way all the time. For his part, Robin just blinked blearily behind his shades and puffed, shrugging.

"Um, sure, yeah. Come on in."

Superboy shuffled past and Robin yawned, closing the door behind the boy of steel and heading back to his bed to flop into it bonelessly. In the dark he slipped his shades off (Superboy politely turned his supervision off) and slipped on a simple sleeping mask instead. Then there was a moment of expectant silence as Robin scooted over.

"Well?"

Not sure exactly what the other boy was waiting for, Superboy just flopped down into bed as well and wow was it comfortable. Robin jumped a little when Superboy laid down the wrong way and shifted to get comfortable, in the end with his head pillowed on the boy wonder's thighs. Robin just let out a bubble of laughter and ran a hand through Superboy's hair, like an overgrown puppy. To his surprise Superboy leaned into it a bit.

"Hah, well, good night. Sleep well, okay?"

Superboy nodded and drifted off surprisingly quickly, and this time his sleep was met with a rather warm murmuring in his psyche, the stirrings of the first real natural dream he would remember.

Superboy didn't make a habit of sleeping in Robin's room, which suited him fine because Robin didn't sleep at the mountain all THAT often and Superboy wouldn't have wanted to stalk him home or anything. He got used to some nights of dreams and some nights of silent slumber until it was no longer a real problem. Months passed, they had many adventures, Conner could feel himself growing and learning and becoming more than what he had been. More than he had been made to be. He'd tasted first love on M'Gann's lips, he'd collected a couple of very eclectic companions in the form of a metal ball and a big white wolf that both seemed to love him and he loved them back.

He'd managed to go all that time, however, without having a single nightmare. Maybe it was his self-assurance, or that he saw enough weird stuff in his real life that his mind hadn't cooked any up… But one night he woke with a start, the fading miasma of the nightmare retreating from his perceptions. He couldn't remember what it was about, but it had shaken him to his core… A sense of loss was over him, like the dream might have been about losing his little family… Wolf woke up and nosed at him and he pet his ruff. There was only one person he knew to go to at times like this. He knew he could go to M'Gann but that might have been rushing things a bit, and besides he didn't want to show this sort of weakness to her.

Robin, though, he trusted implicitly.

This time, when Robin answered the knock on his door, he was met eye to eye by a massive white wolf and right next to it was a sheepish looking Conner in his pajama pants and nothing else, eyes hard and confused and pained. Robin looked just like that first time, including the expectant chuckle and leaning against the doorframe.

"Can… we sleep in here with you?"

Wolf gave an answering whine and nosed at Robin's chest. He let out an exaggerated sigh and nodded, letting them into his room. Wolf curled up at the foot of his bed and Conner made himself right at home, curling into the covers and raising one beefy arm expectantly. Robin let out a soft chuckle and, in the dark, his blush was hidden.

"All right. Sleep well, okay?"

This time when Robin took off his sunglasses he didn't put on the mask (Superboy didn't know who Dick Grayson was and even if he did who would he tell?) and shared in the trust the big teen had for him. He crawled into bed and Conner wrapped them both up in blankets and muscled limbs, as simply comfortable as ever. Conner huffed into his hair after he got comfortable and drifted off in minutes.

Dick let himself be cuddled like a teddy bear and pillowed himself on Conner's bare chest, fondly smiling against his skin and enjoying the familiar warmth, familiar scent and the warmth of trust, safety and family.

And perhaps, in a dark corner of his heart, he felt a sharp green flare of envy of Megan.


End file.
